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Poster: wisconsindead Date: Feb 6, 2015 4:59pm
Forum: GratefulDead Subject: Re: Keith switch from acoustic baby grand

watching sunshine daydream the other night got me wondering how keith made some of his sounds on that baby grand piano. You know that one part near the end of the Dark star? right? wtf!?

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Poster: Dudley Dead Date: Feb 7, 2015 8:17am
Forum: GratefulDead Subject: Re: Keith switch from acoustic baby grand

I think he had some sort of electronic manipulation of his piano, sort of like a wha-wha (?) . You see on top of his piano (in the rare shots of him in the film) along with a can of Hamms, an electronics box, could this be some sort of controls, to switch in-line those effects, or maybe his monitor settings ? I think LIA mentioned this somewhere along the way (?).

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Poster: light into ashes Date: Feb 7, 2015 7:48pm
Forum: GratefulDead Subject: Re: Keith switch from acoustic baby grand

From Grateful Dead Gear, p.113:
"Rather than capturing the piano sound with conventional microphones in the live setting, they used special pickups designed by Carl Countryman... Bear notes, 'It was charged with a very high voltage, and thus was very cantankerous to set up and use. It had a way of crackling in humid conditions and making other rather unmusical sounds if not set up just right, but when it worked it was truly brilliant.'
Countryman's pickup control box also allowed Keith to attach a wah-wah pedal, which he used sparingly (and always tastefully) during space segments from time to time."

Possibly Keith had other electronics attached to the piano as well; the altered sound is most notable in the late '72 jams.
Also see: https://archive.org/post/436573/wah-pedal-on-keiths-acoustic-piano

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Poster: Dudley Dead Date: Feb 8, 2015 9:00am
Forum: GratefulDead Subject: Re: Keith switch from acoustic baby grand

Thank you, again .